REL 355 Religion and Politics
Whether it is a debate about the appropriateness of a 10 commandments monument or the wearing of a Muslim headscarf, the subject of religious identities animates politics in complicated and pervasive ways. How people understand religious identities has implications for how they define secularism and freedom, distinguish civil from religious law, and enforce boundaries between public and private. This course explores the politics of religious identities. We consider how religious identities are performed, represented, and mobilized in political contexts and shaped by colonization, migration, globalization, and conceptions of race, gender, and sexuality.